


Becoming Flayn

by QuoteMyFoot



Series: Word Prompts for Three Houses [4]
Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Family, Fish out of Water, Flayn begins learning the art of sass, Gen, Identity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-06
Updated: 2019-11-06
Packaged: 2021-01-23 22:16:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21327559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuoteMyFoot/pseuds/QuoteMyFoot
Summary: Flayn is still adapting to this new role she must fill, but she's determined to do so in her own way - no matter what Seteth says. Spoilers for their backstories.
Relationships: Flayn & Seteth (Fire Emblem)
Series: Word Prompts for Three Houses [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1535843
Comments: 4
Kudos: 64





	Becoming Flayn

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the November daily prompts on r/FanFiction. **November 4 (Magnitude Monday): Verisimilitude – the appearance of being true or real.**

At first, she—Flayn, she is Flayn—finds it difficult to pretend that Father—that Seteth is actually her brother. It feels… too informal. Too familiar, almost. Seteth is not even his real name, just one that they have to make use of for now, but it still feels as though she is crossing a line that she oughtn’t! It’s really quite silly, but Flayn can’t entirely shake the feeling. One ought to respect one’s parents; she remembers that.

Honouring Mother is the only part of her new identity which she doesn’t stumble over. Fishing and meals, the salty scent of the sea, quiet laughter and soft smiles—her memories are vague and misty with time, but it’s the only part she doesn’t need to act. Isn’t it strange that she feels most relaxed in grief?

Father—Seteth discourages her from going out too much. She’ll bring suspicion on them as she is. He’s right, but it stings. _Flayn_ has already lost so much time. To be awake and to be able to take part once again in the joy of living, but to be prevented…

It is a crying shame, is what it is!

But she must master this disguise somehow, or else she will _never _be allowed to go out by her wretched father! Perhaps if she can sneak away from their rooms every now and then, when he is busy attending to Rhea, she’ll be able to get more experience in the outside world without anyone the wiser…

* * *

Flayn is constantly amazed by the new era that she’s awoken in. Much is the same – the nobility and Crests and all that – so that she doesn’t look like a total recluse and arouse undue interest, which is a relief.

But so much is different! Enbarr has expanded, and there is an entirely new wall around the city! Father took her to see the inner wall being built, and she remembers being so fascinated by the complicated system of pulleys and counterweights that the people had engineered to move the blocks of stone. She wishes she could’ve seen this new outer wall being built. Have they come up with new ways to move the blocks? So very ingenious! She must know.

Unfortunately, Seteth finds out about her secret excursions whilst she is busying herself in the library with books about engineering.

At first, he walks past her little station at one of the desks, completely oblivious. She keeps her head down, hoping that he will pass her by, but he doubles back and gapes at her. “Flayn…”

“Yes, Seteth?” she asks innocently.

If she feels a little bit of spiteful glee at the way his mouth pulls downwards—aha! So he is also not used to being addressed so directly!—then she is not concerned about being rude. After speaking to the students at the Officer’s Academy, she is quite assured that it is normal to be somewhat rebellious at their age. And she must fit in, after all!

“…What are you doing here?”

“I am reading!” Flayn answers. “It _is _a library!”

He frowns.

She beams back at him, resolute. _I will not be swayed! I must be able to fit in with everyone if I want to be a student here some day!_

Seteth sighs deeply. Flayn understands that this is typical of older brothers towards younger sisters. She is making a grand success of adapting to her new life so far!

“I thought I told you,” he says, “to stay in your rooms.”

“Perhaps, Brother,” she replies. “It seems I have ignored your directions. How strange!”

“Flayn…”

“Or!” She pointed a finger at him triumphantly and lowered her voice. “Not strange at all. For I am your rambunctious younger sister! It is only natural that I would be disobedient, is it not?”

“_Flayn,” _Seteth said tightly.

She barely resists clapping her hands together excitedly. _I really am doing so well at this!_

The excitement drains away when Seteth crouches down so he can speak to her face-to-face. “Do you understand the danger you’re in?” he hisses, looking pained.

Flayn puts her hands together in her lap, lacing her fingers together and clenching them shut as though in prayer. A prayer to the goddess, maybe? But she doesn’t know the goddess like Rhea and Father.

“These people who are hunting us—you’re too young to remember but—” He puts a hand to her shoulder and squeezes, and it’s like he’s squeezing her insides directly. “They will not… they won’t show mercy. I’m only trying to protect you.”

“But I…” She finds tears falling onto the book on the desk, and hastily pushes it away so that it won’t be ruined. “What is the point in being awake, in _living_, if I am just to hide away and never… never _do _anything or, or meet anyone—”

“Oh, Flayn, that is not what I…” He draws her into his arms and squeezes her tightly. “Of course that is not what I want for you. But you mustn’t put yourself in danger. You will have all the time that you could wish for as you get older.”

“That’s not f-fair!” Flayn splutters. She tries to wipe her eyes, because she wants Father to take her seriously, not to seem childish, but somehow she can’t stop the tears from falling. “I don’t want to let life pass me by any more! Do you know how different Fódlan is now, Father?”

She shuts her jaw with a _clack_ at the mistake, which is not going to help her, but he doesn’t even seem to notice. In fact, he smiles as he wipes away her tears. “Oh, it is not so different as all that.”

“But it _is!_” Flayn pushes the book towards him. “Look, they built a new wall in Enbarr!”

“It looks much the same as the old wall, I expect.”

She shakes her head fiercely. “It’s not about how it _looks, _it’s about how it _feels!_ Now the city is so much bigger and… and full of so many new things! And new people and ideas and—”

He doesn’t understand. She can see by the frown on his face, polite confusion, that he doesn’t understand. And Flayn lacks the words to tell him all of it—that even her minimal interactions with the students and the teachers have shown her Fódlan in a whole new light! Maybe basic things are the same, like the nobility and Crests and walls in Enbarr, but so much else is different that it feels fresh and exciting! The ways of talking, even the ways Flayn learned one shows deference to a parent, they’ve _changed._

Even just the walls in Enbarr—she read in the books that it was because the city outgrew the walls, and then the armies of Dagda and Brigid came for them centuries ago, so they built a new outer wall to encompass the city and _how can he not see?! _The stupid walls are not the point! It’s the people who built the walls, the people the walls have built! And she’s missed so much of that, she’s missed all the people-of-Enbarr-out-of-walls, what must they have been like, of the city yet not in it; vulnerable and scared when war came—what then when the work began on the new city walls, and now, _and now, hundreds of years later, _people who’ve lived behind those walls beyond living memory—

All the people that Flayn has missed, asleep.

Well, she won’t any more.

She takes a deep breath. “It’s not acceptable.”

Seteth blinks at her. “What?”

“This arrangement. It’s not acceptable.” She takes her resolve and uses it to straighten her spine, make her like steel—like the vague memories she has of Seiros. “I don’t care if it’s for my own protection! I am a part of this world and I want to really _live it!”_

He stares at her.

As the silence continues, uncertainty begins to creep upon her. “A-And anyway, if I remain shut inside all the time, it will only draw more attention to us!” she adds hastily. “Some of the students I met with didn’t even know you had a… sister. I said that I hadn’t been well, but… people will talk about it and someone might hear! Won’t that negate the point of us coming to Garreg Mach in the first place?”

After another long moment, he sighs. “And I suppose, for the sake of _staying in character_, you will simply disobey me if I say no.”

Flayn nods, holding her breath.

“Oh… very well, then. But you must make sure to…”

She doesn’t hear the rest of the sentence over her squeal of joy, but she promises herself that she will attend to Seteth’s stipulations later. Despite his attempts to talk over her delighted ‘thank you’, he is smiling at her happiness, and she is equally relieved to have his blessing.

After all, no matter what they call one another, they are still a family, are they not?

**Author's Note:**

> Any and all comments welcome!


End file.
